Well, here I go again. The tears are falling once more and it just took two glasses of wine to make it happen.

I am on my way home to Florida from England, following a visit with my daughter, Maiteland, and her two children. Next time I write a story on an airplane I will probably be coming back from visiting them in Spain. There’s no getting around it; no matter how many miles apart we live, my daughter’s life is definitely enmeshed in mine. Her children are my heartbeat as much as she is. And I just left them behind… again.

I was with my daughter and her kids in England for fifteen days and it was like riding a merry-go-round the entire time. Or, to be more honest, a roller coaster, with emotions going round and round, up and down, and a little bit out of control.

As for me, I’m usually a stoic during such situations and I don’t break down until after the fact. That is where I am now. “After the fact” and heading home, with a worried mind and an aching heart. And the wine isn’t helping as much as I’d hoped.

I try hard to stay strong. That’s just how I am; I want to be strong. I have been taught to depend on myself and that is what I do. But emotionally-charged situations can sometimes dredge up deep-seated memories and what my daughter is going through right now is like watching a rerun of my own life’s movie, roller coaster and all.

Maiteland is the same age as me in my flashback and, like me, is getting ready for a divorce. The breakup involves two small children and my heart is full of sorrow because I already know what this journey is like. I don’t tend to dwell on the past but, because this is my daughter, the memories come back in floods.

My grandson, Joshua, is five years old and Bella, my granddaughter, is seventeen months. When I divorced my sons’ father, my boys were not as young as that. My older son was nine and my youngest was seven, almost eight. They were twenty-one months apart in age.

That was one stage of my life; then after another nine years or so, I divorced my daughter’s father and left for Florida. Maiteland was four at the time and I was every bit of thirty-seven years old. That is the age of my daughter now… thirty-seven. The pain goes away but the memory does not.

My life has taught me a lot and I feel I have come a long way but, even with a wealth of life experiences, I can help my daughter only so much. I can support her decisions and lend her some strength, but she needs to make the moves. She needs to do what she feels is best for herself and her two children.

You know and I know that life is good, but sometimes things can get a little “crazy.” That’s a good word for all the confusion and challenges life brings and, of course, we worry about making the right decisions. In my spiritual training over the years, however, I’ve learned that there’s no such thing as a “wrong” decision; we just do exactly what we are supposed to do at the time. I sincerely believe that now, but I wish I had known that spiritual truth when I was younger. It would have lifted some of the heaviness from the load I felt I was carrying. My daughter knows the decisions she is making now are the correct ones for her so I stand back and allow. It’s all good.

I feel fortunate about the fact that Maiteland and I can talk about these things and our discussions often revolve around spiritual solutions. We talk about our dreams, our feelings, and what the Universe has in store for us. My heart hurts, knowing first-hand just what she’s going through right now and I hope my life experiences can help her to get where she needs to go.

I know my son-in-law is having problems with all this, but I try to stay neutral. He is a good father and I understand that he’d feel devastated about being separated from his children. I know his love for Joshua and Bella is strong and I’m certain he will fight back as much as he can. I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes… or my daughter’s so, to be fair, I will do everything in my power to stay neutral.

Hopefully some kind of peaceful solution will come that makes sense for both of them. The twist, however, is that my daughter may be forced to move back to Spain because she has been denied residency in England. She and my son-in-law have been separated for over six months now and that denial for residency is a blow for all involved. Visitation is not so easy when it’s across the English Channel.

The first time Maiteland and I were in Spain together, she had a vision at a castle we visited. The vision was from a past life in which she was supposed to get married, but it did not transpire. The vision was so powerful that she started crying immediately and it took me a while to calm her down.

I feel she has karma there that still needs to be resolved, not to mention that there is something about Spain that has a strong hold on her. In eight years of marriage she and her family went back and forth several times. Spain to England, England to Spain. Perhaps this time she can get grounded and truly find out what Spain has to offer her. I personally love Spain; the climate is superb and the mountains and water views breath-taking. It’s like getting the best of both worlds.

But, life moves on doesn’t it? Sometimes in conversation I’ll toss out the phrase “to be continued” and that’s the situation with my daughter at this time. Because of our very close relationship, I’m sure it means the same thing for me.

So I say, with a large measure of hope and trust that all is in Divine Order – stay tuned, this story is definitely going to be continued.